Walk reel mowers are known for precision cutting of grass and the like, such as the grass found on golf greens. Such reel mowers have a frame which carries a front mounted reel cutting unit. A rear handle extends upwardly from the frame to allow an operator to walk behind the mower to guide and operate the mower. The handle includes various controls for allowing the operator to selectively engage and disengage the traction and reel drives of the mower.
Electrically powered walk reel mowers are known. British Patent 985,287 to Southall discloses such a mower having two electric motors. One motor powers the traction drive and the other motor powers the reel drive. The mower carries a battery for providing electric power to the electric motors. Access can be had to the battery through a removable panel.
One problem with known electric walk reel mowers is their limited range. It is desirable that such mowers be able to cut at least three or four average sized golf greens with one fully charged battery. However, this is not typically possible with common battery and motor combinations. Usually, only one or two golf course greens can be adequately cut with one fully charged battery.
Accordingly, it is necessary to carry additional fully charged replacement batteries and to periodically swap or exchange a new, fully charged battery for a depleted battery on the mower. This is a relatively cumbersome and time consuming process for known electric walk reel mowers, requiring that one battery be disconnected and removed while the new battery is placed and reconnected. This entails some time and effort. In addition, it requires that a supply of replacement batteries be carried and be on hand with such batteries being easy to recharge. Again, this requirement is not met by existing electric mowers. As a result, electrically driven walk reel mowers have not been nearly as commercially successful as their counterparts powered by internal combustion engines.
Apart from how a walk reel mower is powered, whether such power be from an electrical motor or internal combustion engine, such mowers can be relatively tricky to operate particularly for an unskilled operator. When mowing a golf green or the like, the operator drives the mower across the green at some predetermined ground speed. This ground speed is often the highest speed provided by the traction drive so that the operator can minimize the amount of time it takes to cut the green. As the operator approaches the boundary of the green after making a cutting pass across the green, the operator must turn the mower around to come back across the green in the opposite direction in another cutting pass.
In turning a walk reel mower around, the operator typically initiates the turn just as the mower reaches the boundary of the green. First, the operator pushes down on the handle of the mower to lift the reel cutting unit carried on the front of the mower off the ground so that the apron of the green is not cut. With the cutting unit held up off the ground by keeping the handle depressed, the operator then swings or turns the mower around by manipulating the handle as the traction drive continues to propel the mower over the ground. Once the mower is turned around to face back in the direction from whence it just came, the operator can then approach the green to start a new cutting pass. As the mower reaches the boundary of the green, the operator then lets up or stops pushing down on the handle to allow the cutting unit to drop back down into engagement with the ground to begin a new cutting pass.
While the procedure for turning a walk reel mower seems fairly straightforward, it requires the operator to speed up and more or less run to stay behind the handle as the mower swings around. This is due to the fact that the nominal ground speed of the mower stays constant and the operator has to move around a much longer path than the mower to stay behind the handle. While skilled and experienced operators learn to properly increase their walking speed during a turn, relatively unskilled or inexperienced operators find it difficult to do. Such operators can lose some control over the mower and often do not get the mower turned around as precisely as is needed for the next cutting pass. It would be desirable for walk reel mowers to be easier to turn.